Keeping Up With Vehicle Recalls

Vehicle recalls, especially RV recalls, can sometimes be difficult to keep track of. If you bought your RV from a dealer, you should receive recall notifications. But if you bought it used, particularly through a private sale, those notifications may not always find their way to you.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has a free app for both iOS and Android devices that can monitor your vehicle’s VIN and alert you when a recall is issued.

I installed the app on my phone and found it easy to set up and use. You can enter your RV, tow vehicle and other vehicles you want to monitor.

There is one thing I’m not a fan of. To receive automatic updates, the app needs to be allowed to run in the background so it can routinely check for recalls and send alerts. I don’t particularly like apps running in the background when they don’t need to. They can use battery power, and there is always that “Big Brother is watching” concern with apps operating in the background.

I chose not to let it run continuously. Instead, I set a reminder to open the app once a month and manually check for recalls. That works just fine for me.

I like free apps, especially when they provide a simple way to stay on top of something as important as vehicle safety recalls. If you own an RV, particularly one you purchased used, this is an easy way to make sure a recall doesn’t slip through the cracks.